I have to address the comment, though, about what us recruiters type on the application. My opinion is that those words hold little weight, if any. It's the application, the person, the "whole" of the candidate that matters...not what one of us recruiters think.
I used to think that, until it was mentioned from NRC that they do read them, not all boards are the same though. I also only wrote what I knew. If I had interaction with the candidates sibling/parents and there was something that stuck out I mentioned it.
I had a candidate (Supply by chance) that was home schooled, then went to a private college, met the entire family, wrote about their interaction, strong support of their child's decision, how the person had been taught to think how their actions affect others, etc.... the person had a ok GPA and was picked up.
The more interesting one when I was at a command picnic, I rec'd a call from a member of the CEC board, it was not the accessions officer I normally dealt with, but he called to ask questions about my candidate and asked some questions as he said I seemed to be very impressed with this young person (I had met parents, wrote how the immigrated to the US, how this person was first to go to college, etc...), after the board and this person was selected the accessions officer I dealt with and I talked, the one accessions officer was thinking about not giving a "thumbs up" on this person but decided to call based on what I wrote, then after talking decided to give the ok.
I am not saying each board reads the OR comments, but except for the beginning of my OR time I wrote as if they did.
